Quotes by British Authors - Page 95

To put it another way, pain is God's megaphone to rouse a deaf world. Why must it be pain? Why can't he rouse us more gently, with violins or laughter? Because the dream from which we must be wakened, is the dream that all is well.
William Nicholson
Sex without smiling is as sickly and as base as vodka and tonic without ice.
Stephen Fry
There pass the careless peopleThat call their souls their own:Here by the road I loiter,How idle and alone.Ah, past the plunge of plummet,In seas I cannot sound,My heart and soul and senses,World without end, are drowned.His folly has not fellowBeneath the blue of dayThat gives to man or womanHis heart and soul away.There flowers no balm to sain himFrom east of earth to westThat's lost for everlastingThe heart out of his breast.Here by the labouring highwayWith empty hands I stroll:Sea-deep, till doomsday morning,Lie lost my heart and soul.
A.E. Housman
Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who sets the planets in motion.
Isaac Newton
My mom used to say, ‘Life isn’t fair,’“ said Shadow.“Of course she did,” said Wednesday. “It’s one of those things that moms say, right up there with ‘If all your friends jumped off a cliff would you do it too?’”“You stiffed that girl for ten bucks, I slipped her ten bucks,” said Shadow, doggedly. “It was the right thing to do.”Someone announced that their plane was boarding. Wednesday stood up. “May your choices always be so clear,” he said.
Neil Gaiman
There is no religion without love, and people may talk as much as they like about their religion, but if it does not teach them to be good and kind to man and beast, it is all a sham.
Anna Sewell
God when he makes the prophet does not unmake the man.
John Locke
GUIL: It [Hamlet's madness] really boils down to symptoms. Pregnant replies, mystic allusions, mistaken identities, arguing his father is his mother, that sort of thing; intimations of suicide, forgoing of exercise, loss of mirth, hints of claustrophobia not to say delusions of imprisonment; invocations of camels, chameleons, capons, whales, weasels, hawks, handsaws -- riddles, quibbles and evasions; amnesia, paranoia, myopia; day-dreaming, hallucinations; stabbing his elders, abusing his parents, insulting his lover, and appearing hatless in public -- knock-kneed, droop-stockinged and sighing like a love-sick schoolboy, which at his age is coming on a bit strong.ROS: And talking to himself.GUIL: And talking to himself.
Tom Stoppard
When you are growing up there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully: the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you. The public library is a great equaliser.
Keith Richards
I’d bet a month of dawn patrols those apprentices had something to do with it,” Birchfall meowed. “Why else would they disappear back to ShadowClan without their mother?”Dustpelt let out a snort of amusement. “I can just picture those three holding Blackstar down until he agreed.
Erin Hunter
We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin. I have heard others, and I have heard myself, recounting cruelties and falsehoods committed in boyhood as if they were no concern of the present speaker's, and even with laughter. But mere time does nothing either to the fact or to the guilt of a sin. The guilt is washed out not by time but by repentance and the blood of Christ: if we have repented these early sins we should remember the price of our forgiveness and be humble.
C.S. Lewis
Don't sit around waiting for it to happen. Get out there and make it happen!
Anthony T.Hincks
Perhaps what is inexpressible (what I find mysterious and am not able to express) is the background against which whatever I could express has its meaning.
Ludwig Wittgenstein
I wish I could hold you," she continued bitterly, "till we were both dead!
Emily Brontë
To have no set purpose in one's life is harlotry of the will.
Stephen McKenna
Rootlessness," I opine, "is the twenty-first century norm.""You're not wrong and that's why we're in the shit we're in, mate. If you belong nowhere, why give a tinker's toss about anywhere?
David Mitchell
A turquoise given by a loving hand carries with it happiness and good fortune."Arabic proverb
Judy Hall
He blinked at the sun and dreamt that perhaps he might snare it and spare it as it went down to its resting place amidst the distant hills.
H.G.Wells
The literary text seems like "a fortified medieval town –foreigners and outsiders are repelled, or allowed in only after rigorous checks, but within all is bustling life; exchange, mutual interdependence and influence are the rule.
Jeremy Hawthorn
Now landsmen all whoever you may be If you want to rise to the top of the tree. If your soul isn't fettered to an office stool Be careful to be guided by this golden rule - Stick close to your desks and never go to to sea And you may all be Rulers of the Queen's Navee.
W.S. Gilbert
Is the mask magic?" he demanded with sudden, passionate interest."Yes." I bowed my head, so that our eyes no longer met. "I made it magic to keep you safe. The mask is your friend, Erik. As long as you wear it, no mirror can ever show you the face again."He was silent then and when I showed him the new mask he accepted it without question and put it on hastily with his clumsy, bandaged fingers. But when I stood up to go, he reacted with panic and clutched at my grown."Don't go! Don't leave me here in the dark.""You are not in the dark," I said patiently. "Look, I have left the candle ..."But I knew, as I looked at him, that it would have made no difference if I had left him fifty candles. The darkness he feared was in his own mind and there was no light in the universe powerful enough to take that darkness from him.With a sigh of resignation I sat back on the bed and began to sing softly; and before I had finished the first verse, he was asleep.The bandages on his hands and wrists showed white and eerie in the candle-light, as I eased my skirts from his grasp.I knew that Marie was right.Physically and mentally, I had scarred him for life.
Susan Kay
But then every man is ludicrous if you look at him from outside, without taking into account what’s going on in his heart and mind.
Aldous Huxley
I lie there for a while in the dusk, then make a decision, little knowing how it will affect every facet of my life and fiber of my being for the rest of my life: I say no to shame.
Alan Cumming
Reported sightings of UFOs are tailing off. With public interest declining and subscriptions dwindling, NICAP and APRO start to compete with each other over membership. The open-minded middle ground is stretched to breaking point, caught between the hardware of scientific detail and the extreme fantasies of contact.
Ken Hollings
Books do furnish a room.
Anthony Powell
I've found that trying to be like everyone else, do what others do and follow others 'guaranteed path' to 'so-called success' never really works for me. I have found my best strategy is to authentically be me, listen within and follow it....and then to treat and connect with others - wherever I can - personally, personably and individually.
Rasheed Ogunlaru
What each culture views as the cause of madness is dependent on its world view.
Peter Conrad
Looking out the window, Moist saw a small swarm of goblins leave the train and at first he thought, ha! Trust the buggers to run away, and then he mentally corrected himself: that was storybook thinking and with clearer eyesight and a bit of understanding he realized that the goblins were scrambling up to the delvers on the rocks and beating the shit out of them by diving into the multiple layers of dwarf clothing. The delvers discovered all too rapidly that trying to fight while a busy goblin was in your underwear was very bad for the concentration.
Terry Pratchett
This is agony cried Mr Salteena clutching hold of a table my life will be sour grapes and ashes without you.
Daisy Ashford
COSMIC DANCER""I was dancing when I was twelveI was dancing when I was aaahI danced myself right out the wombIs it strange to dance so soonI danced myself right out the wombI was dancing when I was eightIs it strange to dance so lateI danced myself into the tombIs it strange to dance so soonI danced myself into the tombIs it wrong to understandThe fear that dwells inside a manWhat's it like to be a loonI liken it to a balloonI danced myself out of the wombIs it strange to dance to soonI danced myself into the tombBut then again once moreI danced myself out of the wombIs it strange to dance so soonI danced myself out of the womb.
Marc Bolan
Thinking is a tiring process; it is much easier to accept beliefs passively than to think them out, rigorously questioning their grounds by asking what are the consequences that follow from them.
L. Susan Stebbing
Humor is my sword and my shield. It protects me. You can open a door with humor and drive a truck right through.
Alan Simpson
Then Maeglin bowed low and took Turgon for lord and king, to do all his will; but thereafter he stood silent and watchful, for the bliss and splendour of Gondolin surpassed all that he had imagined from the tales of his mother, and he was amazed by the strength of the city and the hosts of its people, and the many things strange and beautiful that he beheld. Yet to none were his eyes more often drawn than to Idril the King's daughter, who sat beside him; for she was golden as the Vanyar, her mother's kindred, and she seemed to him as the sun from which all the King's hall drew its light.
J.R.R. Tolkien
Peter was not with them for the moment, and they felt rather lonely up there by themselves. He could go so much faster than they that he would suddenly shoot out of sight, to have some adventure in which they had no share. He would come down laughing over something fearfully funny he had been saying to a star, but he had already forgotten what it was, or he would come up with mermaid scales still sticking to him, and yet not be able to to say for certain what had been happening. It was really rather irritating to children who had never seen a mermaid.
J.M. Barrie
Luck ... taps once in a lifetime at everybody's door but if industry does not open it luck goes away.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The best books... are those that tell you what you know already.
George Orwell
He'd learned pretty early that the illusioned virtuous creatures were no more than that— illusions. Innocence was a community that was used up and consumed fairly quickly. More often than not, innocence was just ignorance, and the true character revealed itself before long— twisted and greedy like the rest.
Camille Oster
A fool without fear is sometimes wiser than an angel with fear.
Lady Nancy Astor
How do we stop them?” Edilio asked. He raised his head, and Sam saw the distress on his face. “How do you think we stop them? When your fifteenth birthday rolls around, the easy thing is to take the poof. You gotta fight to resist it. We know that. So how are we going to tell kids this isn’t real, this Orsay thing?”“We just tell them,” Astrid said.“But we don’t know if it’s real or not,” Edilio argued.Astrid shrugged. She stared at nothing and kept her features very still. “We tell them it’s all fake. Kids hate this place, but they don’t want to die.”“How do we tell them if we don’t know?” Edilio seemed genuinely puzzled.Howard laughed. “Deely-O, Deely-O, you are such a doof sometimes.” He put his feet down and leaned toward Edilio as if sharing a secret with him. “She means: We lie. Astrid means that we lie to everyone and tell them we do know for sure.”Edilio stared at Astrid like he was expecting her to deny it.“It’s for people’s own good,” Astrid said in a low voice, still looking at nothing.“You know what’s funny?” Howard said, grinning. “I was pretty sure we were coming to this meeting so Astrid could rank on Sam for not telling us the whole truth. And now, it turns out we’re really here so Astrid can talk us all into becoming liars.
Michael Grant
Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.
Thomas Huxley
To his inner ear, the cardinal speaks. He says, I saw you, Crumb, when you were at Elvetham: scratching your balls in the dawn and wondering at the violence of the king’s whims. If he wants a new wife, fix him one. I didn’t, and I am dead.
Hilary Mantel
Aft the more honour, forward the better man
Horatio Nelson
She was the storm, she was the lightning...
Neil Gaiman
Every author, however modest, keeps a most outrageous vanity chained like a madman in the padded cell of his breast.
Logan Pearsall Smith
I was thrown together with Florence, or 'Florawns' as she was called, a pert girl of nineteen who worked in our kitchen and was sent out to help me. First, I followed her to a butcher where fat sausages hung from the ceiling like aldermen's chains, and I could choose the best of plump ducks, sides of beef, and chops standing guard like sentries on parade. Once the deal was done Florence paid him, gave me a wink and cast a trickle of coins into her apron pocket. So it seemed that serving girls will pay themselves the whole world over.The size of the Paris market made Covent Garden look like a tinker's tray. And I never before saw such neatness; the cakes arranged in pinks and yellows and greens like an embroidery, and the cheeses even prettier, some as tiny as thimbles and others great solid cartwheels. As for the King Cakes the French made for Twelfth Night, the scents of almond and caramelled sugar were to me far sweeter than any perfumed waters.
Martine Bailey
so this is my collection of human body parts, Dr. Silkston," he said proudly, walking into the storeroom. "each organ is here fro a reason, a purpose. you see this one," he said, pointing to a cylinder containing what appeared to Thomas to be a section of a small intestine with a hole in it. "'Tis a duelist's jejunum. that is the bullet hole, right through the middle. and this, this is the Marquis of Rockingham's heart," he announced proudly. " he gave me a permission to have it a fore he died
Tessa Harris
You still don’t get it, Clark, do you?’ I couldhear the smile in his voice. ‘It’s not your choice.
Jojo Moyes
The love and war in the previous injunctions are of the nature of sport, where one respects, and learns from the opponent, but never interferes with him, outside the actual game. To seek to dominate or influence another is to seek to deform or destroy him; and he is a necessary part of one's own Universe, that is, of one's self.
Aleister Crowley
Hail to thee blithe Spirit! Bird thou never wert That from Heaven or near it Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Reading time is precious. Don't waste it. Reading bad books, or books that are wrong for a certain time in your life, can dangerously put you off the activity altogether.
Lionel Shriver
Better to find your own way than to blindly trust the words of others, whoever they are.
Gemma Malley
You're always you, and that don't change, and you're always changing, and there's nothing you can do about it.
Neil Gaiman
Equal time is not necessary when dealing with evil. Nazis do not merit equal or fair treatment.
Robert Fisk
It's a saying they have, that a man has a false heart in his mouth for the world to see, another in his breast to show to his special friends and his family, and the real one, the true one, the secret one, which is never known to anyone except to himself alone, hidden only God knows where.
James Clavell
Music is my higher power
Oliver James
You wrote my thoughtsFor all the world to seePainted the skyWith immortal words
Marie Symeou
Faith is a passionate intuition.
William Wordsworth
One little Indian left all alone, he went out and hanged himself and then there were none.
Agatha Christie
For when once people have begun to believe that prosperity is the reward of virtue, their next calamity is obvious. If prosperity is regarded as the reward of virtue it will be regarded as the symptom of virtue. Men will leave off the heavy task of making good men successful. He will adopt the easier task of making out successful men good.
G.K. Chesterton
Deliberately to pursue happiness is not the surest way of achieving it. Seek it for its own sake and I doubt whether you will find it.
Robert J. McCracken